MHCR and Activate Labs collaborating to launch the Hive

MHCR and Activate Labs are collaborating to launch the Hive, a digital space to create peace and justice in pandemic times. The Hive is place for peacebuilders, creatives and change-makers to belong, co-create, and grow.

Coming to the Hive, we engage our creativity as we share skills, facilitate conversations, and connect with each other to find hope and joy as we walk together in this time of great uncertainty, pain and social isolation.  Join our Facebook group and Zoom calls as a participant, creative facilitator or small group facilitator. Whether it’s poetry, a story circle, comedy, visual arts, or a facilitated conversation on local creative responses to Covid-19, you are invited to share your talent, skills and passion with a global community.  

Visit http://www.activatelabs.org/thehive to join and learn more!

A Self-Care Guide for Change-makers and Peacebuilders during COVID-19

Around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic has reshaped almost every dimension of our lives. Many of us are seeing how the severity of this crisis is impacting the well-being of our families, communities and ourselves. In this time of increasing uncertainty and instability, the work of community leaders, change-makers and peacebuilders is more critical than ever. However as front-line change-agents, how do we make sure we are also taking care of ourselves?

This “Self-Care Guide for Change-makers and Peacebuilders during the Covid-19 Pandemic” is co-authored by MHCR Program Coordinator, Annalisa Jackson and Research and Practice Fellow Nicholas Sherwood and outlines basic recommendations for change-makers and peacebuilders on how to take care of ourselves and our households during this challenging time of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

A further guide is currently being adapted for peacebuilders in conflict zones. If you have feedback or specific input towards this guide, please contact Annalisa Jackson at ajacks51[at]gmu.edu

MHCR’s First Handbook: A Self-Care Guide to Surviving and Thriving During COVID-19

The onset of COVID-19 has reshaped almost every dimension of our lives: 

Most workspaces are closed. Public spaces are shuttered. Taking care of the ‘essentials of life’, like going to the grocery store or the bank, is an obstacle course. Perhaps most frustrating, of course, is the fact that none of us know when ‘life-as-we-know-it’ will resume.

However, despite the many challenges posed to us by COVID-19, we also have at our disposal many resources to build psychological resilience: the process and ability to transform moments of adversity into opportunities to thrive. Resilience comes in many forms in our lives, from daily habits we can nurture, to the relationships that give us joy and fulfillment. Each of us must now ask ourselves: what sources of resilience can help me survive and thrive during the COVID-19 pandemic?

To help answer this question, MHCR Research & Practice Fellow Nicholas (Nick) Sherwood authored A Self-Care Guide to Surviving and Thriving During COVID-19. This text empowers readers to build a specific, achievable, and manageable plan of action to cope with the ongoing realities of COVID-19. MHCR is proud to offer this handbook to help each of us take care of ourselves, our households, and our communities during these challenging times.

Around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic has reshaped almost every dimension of our lives. Many of us are seeing
how the severity of this crisis is impacting the well-being of our communities. In this time of increasing uncertainty and instability, the work of peacebuilders and reconcilers is more critical than ever. 

Keep an eye on this space – more updates to come!

Healing the past for the future: The Sámi in Finland -- A model for reconciliation?

Research Professor Antti Pentikäinen, director of the Mary Hoch Center for Reconciliation (MHCR), has been assisting the Government of Finland and the Sámi Indigenous People in launching a Truth and Reconciliation Process. The Sámi are the last living indigenous people in Europe. For centuries, they have been subject to colonial policies and assimilation.

A new documentary video speaks about the importance of the process and outlines the uniquely designed three-track approach, which aims to address legacies of intergenerational pain. The work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission will be complemented with the training of insider reconcilers and the advancement of trauma healing. The insider reconcilers will receive academic training on reconciliation practices and lead intra- and inter-communal reconciliation efforts. The trauma healing will be equally led by a Sámi specialist. 

The Mary Hoch Center for Reconciliation is partnering with the United Nations Permanent Forum for Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) to continue these training sessions in Inari, Finland, in February 2020 for mainly Sámi and Inuit participants. Pentikäinen will be providing these training sessions with Eduardo Gonzalez and Anne Nuorgam, the latter of whom is the Chair of the UNPFII. 

The culture and experiences of the Sámi have recently been highlighted in the popular movie Frozen II. Disney worked with Sámi parliaments and signed a contract to respectfully portray their culture and release a version of the film with dubbing in the Sámi language.

Workshop in D.C. explores how to improve the impact of reconciliation

By Annalisa Jackson

On the morning of October 4, 2019, leading practitioners and scholars from government agencies, universities, and NGOs gathered at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C., for a one-day workshop on “Improving the Impact of Reconciliation.”

During the workshop, which was organized by the Mary Hoch Center for Reconciliation (MHCR) with Inclusive Peace and the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), the conceptual frameworks of reconciliation and best practices in post-conflict reconciliation processes were discussed, highlighting the experiences of local peace activists and reconciliation practitioners from Nigeria, Colombia, and Iraq.

The workshop was the first event organized by the Mary Hoch Center, the newest center at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University in Arlington, Virginia. As MHCR is committed to bringing scholars and practitioners of reconciliation together to research reconciliation practices and develop the impact of ongoing and future reconciliation processes, this workshop marked an exciting beginning to its activities.  

The breadth of backgrounds represented among the workshop participants reflected the many forms that reconciliation processes can take.

“It’s a relief to see that there are many variations on the definitions,” commented Beatrix Austin from the Berghof Foundation after a mapping on reconciliation was presented by Simon Keyes of Winchester University. Keyes’ mapping presented the widely differing conceptualizations of reconciliation, ranging from community to state-level and from “minimalist” to “maximalist” approaches. His presentation began the morning’s discussion on the conceptual framework of reconciliation.

“What’s necessary is not to be overwhelmed by all the definitions but actually to locate ourselves on which type of reconciliation we are working with,” Austin continued. In her own presentation, Austin highlighted that reconciliation often happens in complicated and messy contexts and requires both humility and caution. She suggested that “our intentions should be in strengthening the field and keeping reconciliation people-centered.” 

During the workshop, the presentation of case studies reinforced the need for people-centered approaches to reconciliation.

Read full article here.

Insider Reconcilers Dialogue for Sustaining Peace

What can we learn from the failing reconciliation process in Northern Ireland? Antti Pentikäinen writes on “Insider Reconcilers Dialogue for Sustaining Peace” in Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation latest publication.

Full article here.